John Rutter has been compared with English author Charles Dickens for the impact he has made on the Christmas season. Rutter has composed and/or arranged over thirty-seven Christmas carols and over a hundred choral works. This carol is called What Sweeter Music and it was penned by Robert Herrick. Rutter took Herrick's text and dressed it up a bit and made it a bit more modern and then put a classy music wrapper around it.
I really like the part that says Christ's birth gives “life and lustre…to heaven and the under-earth.” Christ certainly has given life, lustre and meaning to my life.
Notice it’s not until the 5th stanza that both men and women come together to sing. It may have something to do with the text “we” and “ours.”
There is no sweeter music than Christmas carols! How has Christ given life, lustre and meaning to your life?
What Sweeter Music
What sweeter music can we bring,
Than a carol, for to sing
The birth of this our heavenly King?
Awake the voice! Awake the string!
Dark and dull night, fly hence away,
And give the honor to this day
That sees December turned to May.
Why does the chilling winter’s morn
Smile, like a field beset with corn?
Or smell like a meadow newly-shorn
Thus, on the sudden? Come and see
The cause, why things thus fragrant be:
‘Tis he is born, whose quickening birth
Gives life and lustre, public mirth,
To heaven, and the under-earth.
We see him come, and know him ours,
Who, with his sunshine and his showers,
Turns all the patient ground to flowers.
The darling of the world is come,
And fit it is, we find a room
To welcome him, to welcome him.
The nobler part,
Of all the house here, is the heart,
Which we will give him; and bequeath
This holly, and this ivy wreath,
To do him honour; who’s our King,
And Lord of all this reveling.
What sweeter music can we bring,
Than a carol, for to sing
The birth of this our heavenly King?
I love this carol! I have been listening to it since 2001 when I worked at Interpace Brick in Orem. I love John Rutter!
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ReplyDeleteWhy does the chilling winter’s morn
Smile, like a field beset with corn?
Or smell like a meadow newly-shorn
Thus, on the sudden? Come and see
The cause, why things thus fragrant be:
‘Tis he is born, whose quickening birth
Gives life and lustre, public mirth,
To heaven, and the under-earth.
We see him come, and know him ours,
Who, with his sunshine and his showers,
Turns all the patient ground to flowers.
John Rutter never disappoints! What a beautiful carol to our King!
ReplyDelete